CNN's Don Lemon blasted President Donald Trump as "hypocrite-in-chief" Thursday night after revelations that undocumented immigrants were hired to work at Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey.
"Hypocrite-in-chief?" Lemon retorted as he tore into Trump's Bedminster retreat, "where the initiation fee alone is more than $100,000" for employing people "managers allegedly knew were in the country illegally."
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The New York Times reported on Thursday that Victorina Morales, who admitted she has been in the United States illegally since 2013, "made Donald J. Trump’s bed, cleaned his toilet and dusted his crystal golf trophies."
Morales admitted having entered the US from Guatemala with phony papers. Morales told the times that "there are many people without papers" working at Trump's resort.
During the 2016 presidential race, Trump scoffed at rumors suggesting he had hired undocumented workers. “We didn’t have one illegal immigrant on the job,” Trump said at the time.
The Trump Organization responded to the Times story denying it knowingly hired workers with fake papers.
“We have tens of thousands of employees across our properties and have very strict hiring practices,” Amanda Miller, the Trump Organization's senior vice president for marketing and corporate communications, said in a statement. “If an employee submitted false documentation in an attempt to circumvent the law, they will be terminated immediately.”
Lemon said Trump should “clean house himself first" if he plans on continuing to demonize immigrant laborers, including possibly closing the Bedminster golf club.
“What’s hypocritical is this president demonizing immigrants for his own political purposes,” Lemon said. During the presidential race, Trump decried immigrants as criminals and rapists.
Lemon also called out Trump's hypocrisy over so-called "chain migration," through which First Lady Melania's own parents were able to gain American citizenship.
Trump's "blatant scare tactics" over immigrants, Lemon noted, became even more egregious due to his policy of separating families at the southern border and "locking them in cages."
Lemon then torched Trump over his broken promise that he would get Mexico to pay for a border wall.
The hypocrisy is pretty self-explanatory.
"Do as I say, not as I do" is a trademark of this presidency.
Morales told the Times that her job at Bedminster always left her surprised at the people she would encounter.
“I never imagined, as an immigrant from the countryside in Guatemala, that I would see such important people close up,” Morales said. She added that Trump's vitriolic rhetoric against immigrants has hurt her and her colleagues' feelings.
“We are tired of the abuse, the insults, the way he talks about us when he knows that we are here helping him make money,” she said. “We sweat it out to attend to his every need and have to put up with his humiliation.”
One of Morales's coworkers, Sandra Diaz, was an undocumented worker from Costa Rica when she was employed at Bedminster from 2010-2013. Diaz told the Times that workers with fake papers were hired regularly and that management knew about it.
“There are many people without papers,” said Diaz.
The Times wrote:
"There is no evidence that Mr. Trump or Trump Organization executives knew of their immigration status. But at least two supervisors at the club were aware of it, the women said, and took steps to help workers evade detection and keep their jobs."
Morales gave additional details about her run-ins with Trump, for whom she would perform housekeeping and maintenance services.
"Morales has had dealings with Trump that go back years," wrote the Times, "and her husband has confirmed that she would on occasion come home jubilant because the club owner had paid her a compliment, or bestowed on her a $50 or sometimes a $100 tip."
In one instance in 2012, Trump asked Morales to accompany him to the clubhouse, where he proceeded to check for dust.
"You did a really great job,” Trump allegedly told Morales before handing her a $100 tip.
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